Quote:
Originally Posted by MacEachaidh
[...]The subject is actually a noun that is implied, and not visible in the sentence. The phrase in full is in fact "1 boy out of 6 boys", which boils down to "1 boy" being the subject. Similarly, you could express the phrase as "1 boy in 6", which still makes "1 boy" the subject. So yeah, the subject is singular.[...]
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When I see "1 in 6 boys" I read that as a proportion of a population (16.67%), not as "1 boy out of 6 boys" - the latter suggests there are only 6 boys. In mathematical terms it reads as: (1/6) x boys. I can find no way to interpret the original sentence such that the subject is "1 boy" - and I am pretty certain that is not the intention.